Two buy Skidmore House, Northport's oldest

The oldest house in Northport Village just got a chance to reach its next semiquincentennial.

The 250-year-old Skidmore House, built in 1761, has been part of the village since before there even was a village -- or a country.

Despite its rich past, the home's future had been in jeopardy. It languished for sale for more than two years, prompting the owner to move toward demolition -- until two local history buffs decided to save it.

Ted Kaplan and his partner, Northport village trustee Henry Tobin, signed the final paperwork on Friday and the two are now the owners of one very old house -- water damage, collapsed garage and all.

"It's the earliest link to the birth of our community," said Tobin, who added he was "doubtful" at first about buying the slowly deteriorating structure. "This is the oldest remaining piece of our community."

The house is showing its age. Two walls are coming apart, while layers of shingles have trapped water and started to rot. The window and door frames also are decaying and there's evidence of previous insect damage in the basement.

The buyers plan to hire professionals to rip off the old, rotting shingles and eventually restore the outside to look original, and possibly add another bathroom to the three-bedroom, one-bath Colonial home.

And after that?

"I have no idea what we're going to do with it," said Kaplan, an attorney who already owns a home in the village. "It just has to be saved."

Both Kaplan and Tobin said in the past weeks dozens of grateful villagers have thanked them for buying the house.

"It was like a lovefest," Kaplan said. "I didn't know that it was that important to people."

Signature Premier Properties broker Joan Gehrke, who sold the house in 1997 and again to Kaplan and Tobin, said she did her best to shoo away developers more interested in the nearly half-acre of land than the house.

"I just didn't want to see it torn down," Gehrke said. She told potential developers "that you really don't want to be the builder who's responsible" for demolishing the house.

By April, the home's days seemed numbered. The previous owner, Brian Goodro, who had moved out of state, had applied to the village for demolition permission, saying that he found a developer who wanted to build a new house.

Village attorney Jim Matthews said the owner had to meet several requirements, including proving that his hardship was not self-created, in getting the permit to demolish the house under the village's historic-structure rules.

Just the threat of demolition was enough for Kaplan and Tobin to decide to buy the property.

Gretchen Haynes, chairwoman of the historic preservation committee of the Northport Historical Society, said the purchase came as a relief to members of her group.

"We need to preserve our history," she said. "You can't make up a building like that."